22.3.12

The sky is blue too - The third week

Let me explain; the past week was the third of my six-week-program and I had made the courageous, if not slightly insane decision to not log into Facebook for 7 full days and nights.

Honestly I thought it would feel like an apocalypse, including sweating, nightmares and all other kinds of cold-turkey-effects.

But it went surprisingly well. Maybe because I was so busy during the day that I didn’t even think of going online. I can see you yawning behind your screen. You were expecting a bit more drama weren’t you?

Well, in the evenings and nights, it was a bit different. How awkward that might sound, I don’t have a Smartphone which notifies me for every little insignificant detail. So I have this routine, when I come home, I sit down in front of the computer and check what’s new.

Now that part of the day was gone. Browsing through new gossip and watching profile-picture-changes were sadly sometimes the highlight of my day. It was the perfect moment to unwind from a busy day.

If I can’t visit my friends who live miles away, then I want to see at least virtually what’s going on in their lives.

And let’s face it, didn’t we all became a bit addicted to the Internet in general? Being online and up-to-date all the time, refreshing your browser every 5 seconds? And when did we become so obsessed about sharing our whole life on the World Wide Web?

Interesting side effect is that I simply visited other websites to kill the time I would normally spend on you-know-what. Sometimes just staring at my screen, avoiding to type the magic word into my browser. The weekend came and I wondered how I would stay away from the computer without being busy. But curiously the need to know what’s going on had lessened a bit. For sure, great weather helps a lot but I felt that something had changed. Only a little bit. I think I felt more independent.

And then arrived Monday. I could log in again, finally. And guess what happened?

Taking a break from Facebook is like stepping of a high speed treadmill, and later trying to get on it again while it still has the same speed.

What annoyed me most is that I had missed a barbecue party. Couldn’t they call me? On the other side if I would call everyone to ask them if they read my message, people would think I had gone crazy.

We became so used to the fact that everybody is checking their notifications everyday, that when someone doesn’t, it automatically becomes a social suicide. What to do…

If you think I came up with a great solution for this problem, you are mistaken. I have a non-virtual life that needs to be taking care of as well. But you can try going offline for a while. Just don’t be surprised when I don’t call to invite you extra.

Oh, by the way, this week I am fasting sweets. It just keeps getting better and better, sigh.